It would be bad enough if the tech giants – drunk on their own wealth and delusions of moral superiority – were asserting themselves as the grand referees of democratic politics.

What’s worse is that they’ve had this status, in part, thrust upon them. Following the shock election of Trump, Democratic politicians – even alleged left-wing radicals – demanded of these billionaire capitalists that they regulate political speech.

Time and again the great and good has demanded that the tech giants police the speech of users, and filter what claims and ideas they are allowed to engage with, because they deem voters too stupid to navigate the new public sphere unfettered.

That for the moment Silicon Valley is populated by technocrats and identitarians, broadly aligned with the outlook of those demanding more bans, is no guarantee that censorship will stay within the bounds many left-wingers seem to think they have set for it.